A Nincompoop

[T]he writer makes a diagnosis, but what he diagnoses is the world; he follows the illness step by step, but it is the generic illness of man.[1] Thus I read Chekhov's Nincompoop, and saw a story about today's ill man that is no longer man confined but a man in dept[2]. For such a man, the life is an ever approaching but never present future. The past is either a sentiment or a gray area, and the present is nonexistent as it is going by while the man is gazed at the future. In this future lie locked all the man's ideals and aims. The future is the promised but forever delayed life.

(…)

Both the sense of unworthy (or not being worth enough) and the fear of losing something that one believes one is possessing are the dominant emotional-mental states of the human being in what Deleuze calls control society.[3] When talking about the contemporary society as the control society, as one of its main traits, Deleuze designates the phenomenon of the endless postponement, opposing it to the apparent acquittal in the disciplinary society that it was preceded by. Nothing is ever finished and everything is in a constant process of being created or yet to be reached. One of the most indicative examples that he gives is the phenomenon of continuing education along with its endless degree stadiums both on the horizontal and vertical line. It is an imposed sense that one can always be perfected[4] – more trained, more educated, which implicitly but unmistakably keeps suggesting that one is not knowledgeable enough or competent enough, therefore, one is never ready enough, i.e. never worth enough. However this chain of conclusions might seem logically incorrect when considered from the position of the "common sense" (or of the classical logics), we should be reminded of the "irrational" human logic that we are far more led by. This irrational logic creates a constant anxiety of imperfection and of not being able to fulfill the expectations. Therefore, one rarely dares trying. Therefore, Mary never dares.

Similarly, one sticks to what one has in the fear of losing even that. However, it is also an illusion, for in the control society one rarely actually has, i.e. owns something. Except for debts, which is nothing but a modern slavery. Even when one does own something, one can never be sure to have the full access. It is like Guattari's imaginary town. One can always fear that the password may be denied or that the figures might be somehow changed or confused. The truth or even the very existence is confirmed by the presence in the system. That is the number noted down in Henry's computer – it is at the same time terribly silly and terrifyingly serious.

However, in my story, Mary is not a poor victim, the oppressed worth of shed tears. Control society, as any type of society, can exist only by the consensus of its members – the people of whom it is consisted. It is supported by their will, or the lack of will to confront it. In Mary's case, it is the latter – the decision that is being justified as a present sacrifice for the future life – the delayed one, the one that will probably never come. Finally, the one she essentially might not even want to come, for desire can desire forms of constancy as much as it desires its fluidity.[5] As stated by May, Deleuze goes further in his political thinking by not theorizing only about the oppressive ideology, but instead questioning mechanisms that constitute the individual's acceptance of oppression. This is probably one of the most thorough insights of Deleuze's thought. It is also, once again, his uncompromising insistence on life, therefore, his deep affirmation of it. He does not remain on the level of general and abstract entities, such are systems, ideologies, institutions, the State or revolutions, where is quite easy to lose the sense of an individual and organic, and almost unnoticeably, to start referring to these entities as organisms or structures completely independent of (even transcendent to) the individuals their existence depends on. As a matter of fact, I find this anticipated in his basic philosophical decision of the idea of immanence. By rejecting the transcendent, i.e. an a priori or external cause to the world, Deleuze is making an ethical step that is certainly not a new one but always remains the most radical – he is bringing down the responsibility back to the individual. His affirmation of life is not a jolly one. His concept of becoming does not mean an utterly improvised life. And his own Ubermensch is not an individual that floats wherever the current takes him to. By taking the transcendent, the substance, the eschatological and untimely away from the human, he demands the Individual. At this point I cannot help be reminded of the parable of The Grand Inquisitor and its main statement: they don't want to be free. Or, what May rightfully claims to be Deleuze's great political discovery: what keeps us all from becoming revolutionaries is not that we are fooled, but that we have come to desire what oppresses us.[6] And we persist in being oppressed for the sake of remaining within constancy, within the familiar. For, more often than not, the fear of the unknown will prevent any genuine movement. That is my reading of A Nincompoop.

Vladana

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[1] Gilles Deleuze, “Re-presentation of Masoch,”in Essays Critical and Clinical, trans. Daniel W. Smith and Michael A. Greco (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997), pp. 53

[2] Gilles Deleuze, “Postscript on Control Societies,” in Negotiations, pp. 181

[3] Although I do not claim that these are the unique qualities of such a society, I do think that they are significantly intensified in it.

[4] And one indeed can, but here the focus is how the fact is being utilized for purposes other than one's perfecting oneself.

[5] Todd G. May, The Politics of Life in the Thought of Gilles Deleuze, SubStance, Vol. 20, No. 3, Issue 66: Special Issue: Deleuze & Guattari (1991), pp. 29 (http://www.jstor.org/stable/3685177)

[6] Ibid, pp.31

Julie Mehretu: Capitalizing on Smooth Capital

During our final evening together (and, indeed, throughout the semester and on this blog) the concepts of smoothness and striation have been especially fruitful, most recently in the presentations by Raul and Vanessa, for instance, partly I think because of the relatively clear visual analogies that they conjure up–to, say, the smooth ocean and the striated urban grid–while related terms like becoming and being remain more abstract. Our understanding of these opposite yet always contiguous if not overlapping notions of smoothness and striation become partly unsettled (or... smoothed?) when Deleuze and Guattari make the further distinction in A Thousand Plateaus (1980) that now, at the "dominant level of integrated (or rather integrating) world capitalism, a new smooth space is produced in which capital reaches its 'absolute' speed, based on machinic components rather than the human component of labor" (492). We addressed this capitalist version of smoothness briefly in class, attributing it to new forms of capitalism that have emerged in the last 30 to 40 years, types of capitalist societies and cultures in which the multinational corporation replaces the State as the dominant agent of control. What makes contemporary global capitalism smooth rather than striated, from what I understand, is that it constantly offers more, and at greater speeds. As an undergraduate professor once put it to me, very helpfully: Whereas pre-capitalist societies and early forms of capitalism said "No," contemporary global capitalism always says "Yes." Though this much is clear, and fairly intuitive, I began to wonder (as this is a question that came up as I was writing my final paper) how we might represent this absolutely smooth capitalism that is constantly in the process of becoming smoother. Having just seen the new exhibition of large-scale mixed media canvases by Julie Mehretu at the Guggenheim, Grey Area (through October 6), her work immediately struck me as one of the most well-developed and eloquent representations of this smooth capitalism in contemporary art. The fact that the works were commissioned by a global bank, Deutsche Bank, adds a further irony to this fact.

Mehretu is an American artist who was born in Ethiopia in 1970, her work consists of large-scale drawings, collages and paintings that she composes as separate layers first on a computer, then projects these digital images onto her massive canvases (each of the six pieces in this exhibition are 11 feet tall and 14 feet wide) and applies a range of materials from acrylic paints and ink to pencil and strips of paper, each in successive layers. Once the different levels (sometimes as many as six) are applied and fixed she makes more gestural, expressionist additions to the final composition. In this exhibition she rubbed and scraped certain areas, creating ghostly patches of erasure, destruction and absence. The resulting compositions are spectacularly busy yet almost infinitely zoom-able; that is, the level of detail in Mehretu's work is such that one can focus on a very small section of any piece and still have more than enough details and layers to tease apart. The super-imposed patterns in each piece include: architectural vectors of virtually every style of building, from classical and Renaissance structures to modern skyscrapers, airports and stadiums; pointillist ink blots that often cluster to evoke flocks of birds or swarms of insects; narrow strips of acrylic paint in neon and pastel hues that, though very subtle, direct the viewers' eyes with sharp diagonal lines; thicker bands and geometric forms of cut-out paper that often bend, curve and loop, suggesting cyclical patterns rather than unidirectional movements; and soft, transparent, cloud-like areas of primary colors.


The very affecting visual challenge in much of her work, at least initially, is to distinguish the various superimposed layers and then understand the myriad ways in which they do or don't work together, continuing and complimenting each other's forms and dimensions. Her process of superimposition, in which the architectural diagrams are always the bottom layer, the first one applied, evokes Deleuze and Guattari's comment that "when the striated attains its ideal of perfect homogeneity, it is apt to reimpart smooth space" (488). In Mehretu's work, the most striated elements, these architectural drawings, seem to give shape to the smoother forms at play above, as if this fundamental architectonic groundwork were necessary to give rise to the churning, slipping and swarming layers that come after. In her work, striation always precedes smoothness in much the same way that striated capital necessarily preceded smooth capital. Her compositions are extremely fluid despite their many rectilinear components. There is often a predominant flow or movement to each piece, whether sweeping across the canvas or swirling in circular currents, but within isolated sections it's nearly impossible to discern a specific direction or perspective. Each composition is made up of seemingly infinite elements and multiple layers that nevertheless contribute to an overarching system that is dazzling, polysemic and unquantifiable. In this respect, Mehretu's work offers what seems to me a very appropriate and nuanced visual representation of the type of smoothness being perpetually generated, expanded and amplified by contemporary global capitalism. Both are impossibly complex systems made up of qualitatively distinct elements–some of which seem smooth while others are irrevocably striated–that nonetheless make up extremely dynamic and smooth forms. Part of what makes contemporary global capitalism so insidious is the way in which it seems to evade representation and resistance by being in a constant state of change of acceleration. Mehretu, it seems to me, manages to convey this process of never-ending renewal, flux and expansion, and with spectacular clarity.

-Ben Sutton

Time Image Striation

My final project is going to be a series of long take video experiments that attempt to evoke the link between action image and time image as well as suggesting their interchangeability. In Gilles Deleuze’s two books on cinema (Cinema 1 and Cinema 2) he talks about the evolution of the film medium by nature of its frames and especially of the images it produces. In Cinema 1 Deleuze describes the images of the classical era as action images. That is to say that they are predicated by cause and effect. Every shot, every movement, every piece of dialogue is motivated in some way, shape or form. The characters in these classical films were always active, never passive. There is always a goal for the protagonist to aspire to and there is always an obstacle that must be overcome. These images remain constant in film until the aftermath of World War II where we see an emergence of a new kind of image. This time image, as Deleuze refers to it as, represents the movement towards modern cinema where characters are reflective instead of active. We see them observe through the frame and as a consequence, the audience thinks and perceives with the character.

I would liken the time-image described in Cinema 2, as a manifestation of another Deleuzian concept, smooth space, which Deleuze discusses in detail along with collaborator, Felix Guattari, in A Thousand Plateaus. For Delueze, smooth space is defined by its unlimited variation and its vast realm of possibility. In the time-image, the viewer and the character(s) are both in an ineffable space absent of any provocation. According to Deleuze, we become a new breed of character in this space because we are contemplative and unsure in lieu of being reactive and physically or emotionally active. This a-centered mental capacity brings the viewer and the character into a state of smoothness where the trajectory of our perception is boundless and our tactile acuity is heightened. Our collective minds become a smooth nomad wandering from thought to thought with no anticipated direction in sight.

On the contrary, the action-image would be of the same ilk as striated space. The formulaic structure of action-oriented plots and movement changes at pre-defined junctures is a form of striation that regulates the delivery and construction of cinema. The viewer was to be ensconced in the narrative so that any other elements of the filmmaking apparatus (i.e. music, soundtrack, camera movement, etc.) were only to be used to enhance the narrative and if they couldn't, they were to be downplayed so as to go unnoticed by the viewer (e.g. cuts in the middle of actions).

So if we can come to the conclusion that the action-image is a form a striation and the time-image a form of smoothness, then we should also be lead to the conclusion that the time-image and the action-image can become each other and reach a point of interchangeability just as it is so for smooth and striated space (e.g. the naturally smooth dessert being segmented and striated by mapmakers) as Deleuze asserts. For Deleuze, neither smooth nor the striated spaces are permanent and impervious to change and becoming. Once again, the goal of my project is to display this interchangeability and constant evolution between the action-image and time-image relationship through the film media itself. This will be done through a series of long take experimental shots that look to alter perception from the haptic to the optic within the same continuous shot. I hope to achieve an affection that is not static, but continuously emerging. Although I’m sure (in true Deleuze fashion) the process of developing these short projects will reveal even more ideas about morphing viewing experience within shots, which can be further explored in future endeavors.

--Jonathan Masino

Revisiting Metropolis

Film Forum is currently showing a restored version of Fritz Lang’s Metropolis. This version contains 25 additional minutes of footage that had been lost for decades. It is sometimes effortless to visually locate the new footage due to the change in the quality of the images. They are somewhat grainer and the colors seem more muted. However, it is easy to overlook this due to the way this additional footage adds to the overall narrative of the film.

I haven’t seen a projected version of Metropolis since I was approximately eighteen years old. It is definitely a film in which the smaller formats do not give justice to the scale of the film, and its visual impact is lost can be lost to an extent. It was nice to see the intricacies of this masterpiece of German Expressionism enhanced as it was projected once again. I think that I had forgotten about how every shot is perfectly framed and every set is visually stimulating. Lang’s ability to play with light and shadow truly helps to accentuate the impressive set pieces.

One of the aspects of this film that I find most interesting is how the narrative remains relevant decades after the film’s production. The class struggle between the subterranean workers and the city planners is timeless. We still see different versions of this class struggle in today’s society. Issues of capitalism can span decades of time as well as bridge cultural divides. Also, the film brings into question the state of our possible “future existence.” It forces the audience to imagine what the future will hold and how we will each be effected by it. Deleuze mentions Metropolis and other Fritz Lang films throughout both Cinema 1 and Cinema 2. He concludes some of his thoughts on German Expressionism in Cinema 2, in which he focuses on how this film movement confronts issues of the future.

The man-machine assemblage varies from case to case, but always with the intention of posing the question of the future. And machines can take hold so fully on man that it awakens the most ancient powers, and the moving machine becomes one with the psychological automaton pure and simple, at the service of a frightening new order: this is the procession of somnambulists, the hallucinators, hypnotizers-hypnotized in expressionism, from The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari to Testament of Dr. Mabuse via Metropolis and its robot. German cinema summoned up primitive powers, but is was perhaps best placed to announce something new which was to change cinema, horribly to ‘realize’ it and thus to modify its basic themes. (263)

The fact that this film is able to still create a cerebral response in its viewers allows us to see magnitude of this film’s impact overall, and how it will continue to be considered an infinitely important film.

Revisiting Metropolis allowed me to see how my relationship with the cinema has changed since I was younger. I remember the first time I saw a projected version of the film in a small screening room in Chicago (as opposed to the home viewing versions I had previously seen), and being humbled by the production design and visual impact of the film. I was extremely impressed by the style of German Expressionism once I was able to view the film on a larger format. However, my recent viewing of the film left me being affected by the film’s narrative. I found the story to be equally as interesting as the visual style of the film, was completely caught up in the characters’ lives. Overall, viewing the restored version of Metropolis was not only an enjoyable experience, but it also was able to remind me how my relationship with the cinema has shifted over the years.

- Stephanie Class

The Trouble With Striation

As a final post for the semester I would like to address something that I have brought up before, but this time look at it from a more personal place. I would like to re-introduce and discuss the distinction that John Rajchman (2000), in The Deleuze Connections, refers to as the difference between “using” Deleuze’s philosophy and “applying” it. He explains that,

One might thus say of Deleuze’s own style – with its peculiar usage of words (including “concept” itself), in composition in series or plateaus, its disparate, seamless “smoothness” and distinctive humor – that it works to encourage “uses” while frustrating “applications,” and so to serve as “interceder” inciting creation or thinking in other nonphilosophical domains (p.118).

Rajchman is thus drawing on Deleuze’s own project (his theory and his mode of writing) in order to determine the appropriate ways in which his work might continue to “move.”

So what exactly does it mean to use someone’s concepts versus applying them? In the case of Deleuze (and Guattari) it is helpful to look at the relationship between some of their main concepts, such as “smooth/striated,” “tree/rhizome,” “map/trace,” and “major/minor.” While the specific philosophical ideas of each of these conceptual pairs are different, their relationship to each other remains similar, and I think that it would be fair to include Rajchman’s “use/apply” to the set. These concepts relate to each other in the following two ways: 1) In each relationship it is not a simple question of one or the other, because one can become the other quite easily and unexpectedly; 2) It is always the more dominant term (striated, tree, trace, major, apply) that tries to regiment, solidify, and homogenize the more fluid and potentialized one (or visa versa).

That said, the problem with using vs. applying strikes me as something that is nonetheless a tad problematic. Why? Because in trying to decide (whether as an artist, philosopher, or scientist) how you are using his concepts, a tendency to striate your process begins to develop. Not in trying to remain academically rigorous and aware of the details of the argument, but in the way that that can turn into simply “re-tracing” that which has already been stated, not keeping it moving, and rendering it solid. In my case, I was editing a documentary for a final school project with the goal in mind of trying to understand the space and time of my Grandparents condo complex in Florida. What I encountered, upon receiving feedback from my production class, was that I needed to cut, cut, cut. I found this to be very confusing because I was caught between trying to remain in step with a practice that encouraged a particular relationship to time and space on the one hand and the demand to make a good (entertaining) film, on the other (and these things I believe are not necessarily opposed!).

In the end, I was not sure whether I was trying simply to apply Deleuze to a process that was increasingly striated or whether I was using his ideas to smooth it out. Ultimately, I have not finished this project and I do not have an answer to this problem but I think, whether you’re an artist or academic, it is important to keep this issue in mind – and remember that it is not about being “Deleuzian” but about increasing lines of flight and keeping things open.

-Vanessa Meyer

Why Do People Go to the Cinema?

Earlier in the semester we discussed Tarkovsky’s writings on the cinema in a chapter from his book, Sculpting in Time. The chapter "Imprinted Time" contained a myriad of intriguing concepts regarding the cinema in general. It was his discussion of the cinema experience that I found to be most interesting. Tarkovsky boldly asks, “Why do people go to the cinema?” He briefly examines the way in which, despite the commercialism and entertainment aspects of cinema, a person goes to the cinema to experience time:

He goes there for living experience; for cinema, like no other art, widens, enhances and concentrates a person’s experience – and not only enhances it but makes it longer, which have to do with the human need to master and know the world. I think that what a significantly longer. That is the power of the cinema: ‘stars,’ story-lines, and entertainment have nothing to do with it [i]

Tarkovsky successfully outlines the reasons why a person looks toward the cinema to experience life. Of course, there are people that depend on the cinema for entertainment too, but there are many more that go to the cinema to learn about life and learn about themselves in the process. I’ve always looked to the cinema as a therapeutic place, an educational place, and sometimes a place to be disturbed or shocked. It is a place to go and figure out yourself a little more through the images presented to you. I feel as though Tarkovsky’s description perfectly explains some of the reasons why I find the cinema to be amazing, interesting, and undoubtedly important to the art world.

However, is this experience negatively effected when the movie theater is taken out of the equation? Although Tarkovsky obviously wrote about cinema before the advent of certain new media and technology, which brought new formats to the film viewing experience, it is relevant to cinema today. Going to an actual movie theater is no longer necessary to view a film. It begs the question, are we losing an important aspect of the cinema by losing the movie theater experience? Personally, a movie theater will always be the optimum choice for viewing a movie. The theater separates the audience from outside distractions, thus allowing for a complete encounter with the piece. At home, the viewing experience is riddled with distractions and interruptions. A viewer can stop and start the movie at any point, work on other things while watching, or even skip through parts completely. Seeing a film in a theater creates a vastly different experience for the viewers than when it is seen in the privacy of their own homes.

Hollywood and capitalism have always been linked to one another. It is difficult not to look at that decline of the movie theater experience as a result of capitalistic ventures. However, one also must not completely put blame on capitalism for these issues. A movie ticket generally costs around $12.50 today. As much as I would always prefer to go to a theater, it isn’t always the most financially sound decision to makes. I can rent movies On-Demand for 24 or 48 hours for $4.99 or less. I can see more movies for the price I would be paying to go to a theater. Also, there are the online renting options, such as Netflix, which allow us to pay a monthly fee that is often times cheaper than one single movie ticket. Overall, the theaters aren’t giving the casual viewer much motivation to go to their venues.

It will be interesting to see how the new media outlets influence the production of film overall. Amateur filmmakers can easily have their work seen thanks to digital technology, which is certainly a positive aspect of the expansion of the cinema. However, many major filmmakers now must take into consideration how their film will be perceived on smaller formats (computers, home television screens, I-pods, etc.). A movie no longer must be viewed on a projected screen, thus possibly changing many of the aesthetic elements of the work.

Overall, the content remains the same no matter where a film is viewed. It is the audience’s response that can be influenced according to venue. The theater allows us to be completely immersed in the images and stories being projected for us. At home, we can allow our own lives to take precedence over the viewing experience. The actual film has not change, but our reading of it has altered according to the attention we give to it.

- Stephanie Class

[i] Tarkovsky, Andrei. Sculpting in Time. (Austin: University of Texas Press. 1989), 63.

The Class as New Media

One of the questions that I was willing to answer my self with this course was how education can be approach with new media. After Hansen reading in addition to other readings related to the field. I realize than more that approaching education with new media is more about education as a new media. One particular statement from Hansen argument caught my attention, the importance of the body.

For Hansen the body is the place where the digital takes place. For me his argument can be well adapted for new education: what is new about new education is that the body is the center of what is possible in this field. If education takes place in our bodies it means that we are in an undefined terrain. I believe that it is only in the undefined where emergent education can evolve. We go back to Deleuze, it is only in the becoming where new education can take place. As Ellizabeth Ellsworth quotes in her book Places of Learning: media architecture, pedagogy. What really exists is not things made but things in the making. Once made, they are dead… (William James).

It is in our bodies where we learn and trough our bodies how we learn. A great metaphor that Ellsworth brings to the field of learning and education is the parkour the sport of the art of moving trough the environment. I saw it clearly: art, architecture, the body moving with out previous maps. But best of all it is understanding this as a metaphor, because it means that this is what should be going on in our minds, in the minds of the teachers, in the design of a syllabus and in the goals of a class, among others. How to achieve the desired skills (just as in this sport the basic movement that you have to master in order to move smoothly) and at the same time be open to the new maps that each learner will trace? That is the challenge of the new education.

The concept of the prominence of the body in Hansen, although is radical about new media, is pertinent for education. First it is the understanding of our bodies as political beings that must be respect and developed consequently. Second as the place where ideas take place, it is about movement again, but the movement that takes place in our bodies even when we are resting, even when we are immobile in this point I disagree with Hansen because what he stating is that movement only occurs in the visible movement. Bergson (the body as an image in continuous movement) will further support the idea of the movement even in motionless.

Finally I would like to say that what is different in new education from Hansen’s postulate about the body it is that in new education the body is not only the receptacle of information or the framer of filter of information, instead of that, the body, the human being is the producer of meaning in education only in its continuous responses to knowledge is where becomes a learning being. What if we start seeing the class as a new media, as a new space where bodies inhabits the universe of knowledge? I’m sure that this is the only way of facing the world to come.

Susana